People are trying to lie to you. Or maybe they just don’t know what they’re talking about. Either way, you shouldn’t listen to them. But how can you tell? Here’s a guidebook of key phrases that indicate someone doesn’t know what they’re talking about when they talk about the economy:

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Creates/destroys jobs. You often hear men of business saying that their company “created” 2000 new jobs. And in some sense that may be true, but it’s probably less exciting if it turned out that they did it by destroying 2000 jobs somewhere else.

The same is true for economic policy in general; it will typically create jobs in one place, but only at the expense of losing them somewhere else. That’s because the number of jobs (i.e. the unemployment rate) isn’t just a free-floating fact of life; it’s specifically controlled by the Federal Reserve.

The Federal Reserve is a cadre of wealthy bankers that, among other things, meets regularly to decide interest rates. When there are too few jobs, they lower interest rates, making it easier for people to borrow money and start new companies, hiring new people and creating jobs. (The current crisis is the rare exception — interest rates are at zero and there still aren’t enough jobs. Thus the stimulus package.) When there are too many jobs, they raise interest rates, making it harder for businesses to start and expand, and cutting back on jobs.

Wait, too many jobs? Yes — remember, the Federal Reserve is run by wealthy bankers. They don’t like it when there are too many jobs, because then businesses have to compete for employees, which means they have to pay more and give out nicer benefits. So they try to keep unemployment around 5%; that way it’s employees who are competing and can be pushed into taking lower wages. (The official justification for this was that if unemployment went any lower, inflation would result. Unfortunately for the theory, unemployment went lower in the 1990s without any sign of inflation.) Plus, workers get a lot less uppity when there are fewer jobs for them to jump ship to.

If you really care about how many jobs there are — and obviously you should — then you shouldn’t worry about particular policies or people, whose effects either won’t matter or will be counteracted by the Fed. You should worry about the Fed and who controls it.

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Helps/hurts competitiveness. Let’s face facts: America isn’t competing with anyone. Remember competition? You sell a widget for $5; I come along and sell it for $4; then you have to either lower your price or lose all your customers to me and go bankrupt.

But America isn’t going to go bankrupt. Countries don’t really do that sort of thing.

Instead, what matters for how well a country is doing is (roughly speaking) its productivity, i.e. how much stuff it makes per person-hour of work. Sometimes you can increase this productivity by working with other countries — by, for example, trading some steel for some coffee. But this is just a way to up your own country’s productivity; it has nothing to do with competition.

The competitiveness bogeyman is often trotted out when someone is trying to get you to do something you don’t want. “Oh, sure,” they say, “you may not want to do it, but the Chinese are and they’re going to eat your lunch.” It just isn’t so. Nothing will stop us from chugging along, eating our lunch just fine; even if the Chinese are eating two lunches.

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Sadly, a lot of “economic commentators” don’t know what they’re talking about, so you see these phrases everywhere. Now that you that they’re bogus, it should save you a lot of time.

Technology is advancing everywhere. No one can doubt that. Increasingly sophisticated demands push experts to improve designs and enhance product quality. This is especially true in military electronic systems, where mission/life critical requirements must be met to ensure the safety of both equipment and people. Military Circuit Breakers, often ignored when designing military equipment are not exception. Military Engineers who designe military vehicles and equipment must rely on circuit breakers to protect electronic devices on the on-board computers in order to ensure reliable performance in mission-critical situations during military operations.

Unfortunately, many experts assume that any circuit breaker will be ideal to provide protection and comply to military specs but many desgins fail or do not pass military revision simply because they don’t use Mil-Spec Circuit Breakers, making many novel, well-designed equipment fail compliance or worse, field tests.

Choosing the correct circuit breaker technology is very important for each application. Each one has its pros and cons and should only be used in certain applications in order to perform as expected. But even if you choose the right type, you must make sure it complies (or exceeds) the requested specifications. Otherwise, it would not pass testing and your time and money will go awaste (and in military applications, you’d be risking field operatives).

Although in this post we’re discussing military applications, choosing the right tool is the first step in any technological development (electronics, software. etc.). The problem usually isn’t choosing the right component but making sure it meets the buyer’s specifications. This can take a long time unless you choose a component provider that already meets those specs. Believe it or not, it can bring success much closer to your door.

Breaking news from The Huffington Post:

Three days after receiving $25 billion in federal bailout funds, Bank of America Corp. hosted a conference call with conservative activists and business officials to organize opposition to the U.S. labor community’s top legislative priority.

Participants on the October 17 call — including at least one representative from another bailout recipient, AIG — were urged to persuade their clients to send “large contributions” to groups working against the Employee Free Trade Act (EFCA), as well as to vulnerable Senate Republicans, who could help block passage of the bill.

…Donations of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars to Republican senatorial campaigns were needed, they argued…”If a retailer has not gotten involved in this, if he has not spent money on this election, if he has not sent money to [former Sen.] Norm Coleman and all these other guys, they should be shot. They should be thrown out their goddamn jobs,” Marcus declared.

Not only are some of the most non-trusted companies in America blatantly trying to buy off Congress, but they’re using our bailout money to do it.

This will ONLY change when elections are citizen funded. Join our strike4change to (1) starve the beast, (2) just say no, or (3) fix this absurd system — now. No money until a candidate commits to citizen funded elections.

From the Huffington Post:

Do sex, campaign money, and Change Congress’s new “donor strike” go together?

According to U.S. News & World Report, they do. Here’s an excerpt from their story, “Sex, Campaign Money, and Cleaning Up Politics”:

Don’t like how our politics are paid for? Some people who agree are pushing what I can only call the Lysistrata campaign finance reform plan. In the ancient Greek comedy, women withheld sex from their soldier husbands until they agreed to end an ongoing war.

Substitute sex for money and you have what the folks over at Change Congress are pushing: that donors go “on strike,” refusing to give their money to pols until a campaign finance overhaul is passed (specifically, they favor a system whereby people limiting themselves to small donations would get matching government funds).

They say that they’ve gotten no-contribution pledges from people who gave $400,000 to federal candidates in the last cycle.

So, you heard it from U.S. News & World Report first! Change Congress is bringing sexy back…to the campaign finance reform debate. (Step aside, Justin Timberlake.)

The “donor strike” has amazing momentum, but we need your help to keep going. There are two things you can do today.

First, if you haven’t already, join the strike. We’re at $422,000 in donations withheld–can you help us get to $500,000? With every new striker, we are increasing the pressure on Congress to pass fundamental reform. It’s easy, just click here.

Second, because Change Congress is fighting the special interests, we don’t get money from the fat cats. So we depend on people like you. We’re setting a goal of raising $100,000 in the next month–starting today. This will allow us to really turn up the pressure on Congress — including targeted events in local districts — to make sure politicians are well aware of how much money they’re losing if they oppose reform. If you care about cleaning up our democracy, please help us keep our successful “donor strike” campaign going by chipping in here today.

The donor strike’s also been featured in the Associated Press, National Journal, Huffington Post, ABC News, and Green Mountain Daily (Vermont). Working together, we’re making progress on this fundamental reform issue–and your help today will greatly help us keep the momentum going.

Thanks for helping to change Congress.
–Lawrence Lessig & Joe Trippi